Bunny Chaos

[Rufus]

Rufus normally lives in a 4×2 cage in our sunroom. Since it's started getting hotter here though, I decided to try and put him in his 4×4 x-pen in my bedroom which is the coolest room in the house. Today I have the day off work so I decided to give it a trial run, I squeezed the x-pen in my room (now you need to climb over the bed to get from one side of the room to the other). Rufus is in there but he's creating absolute bunny chaos! He's tipped all his food all over the floor hay, pellets and greens; he's barged the sides of the pen so much it's in a completely different spot than before and he's now trying to chew his way out. 

Unfortunately he can't be free roam as the house I live in isn't mine and it's also very open plan and there's cords and insect traps quite a bit. I let him out for supervised exploring/play time every day but for now the x-pen is the best housing solution I have. I'm just wondering if anyone has any suggestions on how to make him happier in his x-pen? He has toys and things to keep him occupied but he's ignoring them and focusing on escape attempts. Do you think he'll settle down? Am I safe to leave him in there when I go to work tomorrow?

I also wonder whether he might be acting up because he can see me but I'm not paying attention to him? Any thoughts?

[Rufus]

My post might have been a little pre-emptive. I went and sat in another room to see if he would relax. I just went to check on him and this is what I found

[Rufus]

Argh! I can never get the pictures to work on my home computer. He’s flopped out sleeping in his litter tray and there is mess EVERYWHERE around him. Little champ!

[Rufus]

After his nap Rufus spent most of the afternoon banging against the side of the x-pen and lifting it up with his nose. He cannot seem to decide what shape he wants the x-pen to be in. He escaped twice but both times are avoidable in the future. I just wish he didn’t always want to be outside wherever he is. The new set up is much better but he still wants out! Any tips?

[LongEaredLions]

Could you build a frame for the xpen out of wood so he can’t move it around? Do you have a ceramic food dish? I don’t really know what to say other than keep him busy, could you hang some willow toys on the side of the cage?

[Rufus]

Thanks LEL. He does have a heavy ceramic water dish but maybe I should get one for food too. I’m having the hardest time finding willow toys or apple sticks to chew here in Australia. It’s driving me crazy! I will persevere though.

I thought maybe I would get him a floor for the x-pen. Yesterday he kept digging all the litter and hay to the sides and sleeping in his litterbox instead of on the carpet so maybe he would be more content with a hard smooth floor. That’s what he had in his old set up. If I’m doing that maybe I could look into some sort of frame to hold the x-pen in place.

[LongEaredLions]

I wish I could send you some apple branches, I have a great tree in the yard! Darn customs!
Good luck with the xpen flooring!

[Rufus]

That would be so awesome! Thanks for the offer Crazy Australian Customs, always getting in the way of my bunny toy wishes.

[LongEaredLions]

Mabye we can find a loophole…..
Rufus needs some apple and willow!

[jerseygirl]

Do you have willow trees growing near you?

I just cut off branches. They can eat the stuff fresh or dried. The wood is also super flexible to bend into your own toys.

Has he settled down with the pen now? Sometimes it’s easier to use the pen to block off areas you don’t want them in but let them free-roam rest of room. Only if a buns litter habits and behaviours allow of course.

Some disadvantages to doing that are:
Easy access for rabbit to top of bed
Rabbit could escape into other areas of house. Also be trying that everytime you come and go from the room. Lol
Little protection if other pets come into the room.

[Rufus]

I don’t know of any willow trees growing nearby I’m in Sydney if anyone has any ideas! I keep looking through $2 shop craft sections and seeing stuff made from willow but it always has nasty coatings on it.

He has settled in a little better now. I’ve done what you mentioned and sectioned off the dangerous parts of the room and he’s got most of the room to hang out in. He still gnaws on the bars a lot. He’s got so many toys in there! From where I’m sitting now I can see toddler stacking cups, toilet roll with hay, paper towel roll with hay, cat tunnel, cardboard boxes, phonebook and wooden chew toy. There’s also tables with lower shelves that he likes to sit on. Of course he mostly likes to use those to try and chew holes in my mattress but oh well. He gets up on my bed very easily which isn’t a toilet problem, he’s always hung out in my bed a lot. The only thing is that he can jump down from the bed into the caged off area so I have to keep an eye on him.

Unfortunately I haven’t been able to leave him in there when I go to work. He completely refuses to pee in there no matter how long I leave him. I’ve tried about 12 different litterbox options and he just holds it in until I put him back in his cage, rushes over to the litterbox and goes straight away. I feel so bad for the little guy and he tends to get more restless and destructive when he obviously needs to go. My parents used to have a Great Dane that was scared of the rain. She was a house dog with permanent access to the balcony and she went to the toilet on the balcony. Everytime it would rain for a day or two she’d get a bladder infection from refusing to go outside to the bathroom. I really don’t want that to happen to Rufus so I’m reluctant to leave him in the pen for more than about 4 hours at a time How did I get such an eccentric rabbit?

I’m so sad that he still has to go back into his smaller cage but I can’t incorporate it into the setup in my room and there’s no where in the house where I can have the x-pen and cage together. I’m hoping to move soon but it’s driving me crazy in the meantime. I just let him run around in his pen in my room as much as possible (with toilet breaks every few hours…)

[jerseygirl]

Strange little Fluffer! Great that he has such impeccable habits though. Try not feel too badly about putting him in the cage then. It’s obviously a place he feels secure.

When I let my rabbits into areas they run around for 5-10 minutes then tuck themselves away in a little spot. Under hidey box or back to their designated area. They choose to go into a smaller space and spend hours there.

Re willow trees, most commonly you’ll find them growing alongside the river systems.

ETA: love Danes!

[Rufus]

Thanks Jerseygirl. He does seem pretty happy with a couple of decent hours to run around and then hanging out back in his cage. A lot of the time now when I let him out in my room he just flops out on a pillow and waits for pats for a while before having a binky and zoom around.

That’s great about willow trees, there’s a river not far from here. Do you think they’d be ok to get branches from? They wouldn’t have been sprayed by the council or anything?

My parents just got a new Great Dane puppy, she’s about 8 months old (and already weighs 50kg). I’ll put some pics up when the photo upload is working again

[Rufus]

Pics are working! So this is the pen before I made the floor:

You can see he likes the litterbox, but just won’t pee there!

This is him in the pen with the new floor:

  

And this is Dharma, the Great Dane puppy just cos she’s adorable:

 10 days old 

  5 months old. And still growing!

[jerseygirl]

Omigoshhhh!!! She’s totally gorgeous! Thanks for sharing the pics. Feel free to keep doing so!! Lol

Rufus is like my Rumball.
I love the white bellies showing. : )

Did you try 2 boxes in the pen ? The one he has and the one he normally uses in the cage?

[Rufus]

I love the white bellies! So cute!

I did try both the old and new litterbox at the same time and I tried with a little bit of used litter in both of them so he’d have the smell. No luck unfortunately! I also tried putting one in the corner of the room, because his normal one is in a corner with wood on two sides, and he really hated that and dug all the litter out all over the carpet. Frustrating! You’d think that I’d litter trained him by beating him or something!

[Author]

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